


Cold Hands, Warm Heart

by Daniverse



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Demons, Angst with a Happy Ending, Dehumanization, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-11
Updated: 2021-01-20
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:46:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 19,497
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27498181
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Daniverse/pseuds/Daniverse
Summary: Within weapons scattered throughout Fodlan, demons lay dormant inside them offering strength, skill, and secrets at the price of a pact. Each Relic Weapon holds a demon that has been passed down from generation to generation, catching the students of Garreg Mach off guard when they take back the Lance of Ruin after watching Miklan morph into a demonic beast. When Felix and Sylvain find Dimitri five years later clutching Areadbhar in hand, they fear that their friend traded away his soul for the power to turn the tides on the war. Felix takes it upon himself to find the Dimitri hidden behind years of emotional turmoil and mental instability once he realizes he is the only one who can break through to him.
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/Felix Hugo Fraldarius
Comments: 6
Kudos: 17
Collections: Dimilix Big Bang





	1. Pact

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dimitri gets some help as he breaks out of his prison and retrieves Areadbhar and runs into a familiar face along the way.

_1181_

Dimitri was intimately familiar with death. He watched his father die, he watched his step mother die, he watched his best friend’s brother and one of his closest confidants die. He watched Duscur burn and could do nothing but weep for it, rescue a single person from the rubble and pledge it would never happen again.

Dimitri was a killer, had been since that fateful day on the road to Duscur. The young prince died that day as well, left with only a monster to take control and to kill in his stead. To swear to find the one who did this, the woman whose hands held the axe But Dimitri never killed his uncle. The man was not the source of his ire, he never wore the red of the Empire. So why was he here, locked away in a dungeon to be executed? He could handle the problem, kill the one responsible. He could not stay here, no matter how much he deserved to die.

Not here, not for this.

It was easy to break the chains that held him. He was a Blaiddyd, after all, and his strength was nigh unparalleled. There were so many men in his way, so many bodies he added to the ever-growing list with his bloodstained hands. These men did not have names, only faces that passed by, slow and sluggish in the thick haze of his mind, each heavy step echoing through once bustling corridors. They fell, one after another, mere stepping stones on the path to escape.

He had been here countless times. He knew these halls better than any red-swathed guard. This had been his home once, a place where his father would lift him high, high up onto his shoulders. A place where his stepmother sat quiet on her window seat, smiling fondly at him like he was the sun, like he was _her_ son.

His hands were raw, knuckles white as he gripped a lance he stole. His mind reminded him, somehow crystal clear around the noise and bedlam, this was not the weapon he needed. No, what he needed spoke to him deeper in the halls, safely within the armory. Dimitri never had been one for stealth. Now, the floors and walls painted red with every poor soul the Witch had locked him here with. There was no hope for them, no hope when they were caged with a beast like him.

A boar.

He approached the weapon, long and curved and monstrous where it hung on the wall above him. Still too large. Like he was a child, holding a destiny meant for a man. He felt the warm hands of another join his and he whirled around, pointing the tip of Areadbhar at the intruder. _Dimitri_ , it said, and Dimitri’s eyes adjusted to the form in front of him, shifting and changing. He was tall, wide-shouldered and outfitted in familiar whites, blues, and blacks of his home.

“Father?”

It shook its head, an apparition of the relic weapon appearing in its grip. _A friend_. Dimitri felt rooted to the spot, his mind turning and whirling as he remembered what power lay behind his family’s namesake. The weapon glowed a dim orange in his hands, its red core blinking with every beat of his heart.

“Another ghost,” he breathed out. It ignored him, eyes on the empty door frame, the door cast aside.

_More men will be coming soon. We should hurry._

The trek back through the halls was easier with the spectre at his side. It mirrored his movements, slaughtering anyone who dared try to cross their path. Dimitri spoke as if they were not at war, as if it wasn’t two against the hundreds of men that filled the stronghold. “I am like you,” he started, cursing at how his voice quivered. Kings did not cry. He sucked in a shallow breath and skewered another man as he continued. “I am a monster, all I am good for is death and pain. A hand for the ghosts that tell me I am never enough.” It remained silent, cutting in front of Dimitri to clear a bloody path. “I did not kill him, you know I did not.” Dimitri’s voice rose as he spoke, over the screams or to prove his point, the motive unclear in the rush. Silence. Dimitri’s hands trembled on the weapon as his voice climbed ever higher in his throat.

“I did not kill him, but I deserve to die. For the suffering I have brought to everyone, I should not be here.” His right hand shot out to yank a man forward, cutting through him with ease. “These bodies are meaningless. The one I must kill isn’t here.”

_Who must you kill?_

Dimitri hadn’t heard the voice, too clouded in his own hunger for escape and retribution. The sentiment continued as they moved as one. “I must kill the Emperor, or they will never know peace. They are cursed to sit by and watch as I sit, _useless_ \--” his breath hitched again as he felt an arrow pierce his flesh. He couldn’t tell where it was, or where it came from, but he felt the burn on his skin. Two more joined the first soon after and he screamed, yanking one from his arm and crushing it in his grip. The ghost disappeared from his side and killed the enemy archers, but its voice rang out in his skull, washing out the complaints of the voices so frequently filling his thoughts.

_Tell me what you need, son of Blaiddyd. I will aid you._

For a blessed moment, all Dimitri heard was the sound of its voice. He fell to his knees, the emotion he had locked within him now flooding out of every pore. The spirit appeared next to him, covering his shoulders with a warm cloak. “Please, please make them stop. I will kill the Emperor for them, but I need them to stop.” It held him as Dimitri clutched its body and wept. If he extinguished the anguish in his heart, he could focus. He needed this weak display of emotion, release, needed to force every inch of sadness out of his bones so he could keep focused on his task.

_I will aid you. Tell me your name, and I will aid you._

“I am Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd. If you help me, I will give you anything. My mind, my body, my soul. Please, make them go away. ” He shook as it held him tight, the world around them slowing to a stop.

_I am Paimon, the demon of the Blaiddyd relic. I will aid you in your cause, as I have each of your ancestors._

“Thank you,” he blubbered, standing on shaky legs as he scanned the horizon, out on the grounds of Castle Fhirdiad. Dimitri couldn’t remember the journey, his head throbbing and his feet aching. He couldn’t stay here, not for long. They would find him again if he wasn’t careful.

He fled the stronghold on aching legs, searching for a place to hide, a place he could heal.

Dimitri ran right into a man in plainclothes with a massive sword strapped to his side, busy as he helped a woman with her shop. Dimitri staggered backwards, the second ghost he had seen that day appearing before him, looking at him with surprise and a degree of consternation. The woman at the shop gasped and dropped her basket, hiding behind the man and barely holding back a scream. Dimitri was ragged and monstrous, black armor and ruby red blood covering up a man who could have passed as their prince.

The ghost had a hand on the hilt of his weapon already, though he seemed to try and look past the gore, the beast huffing and crazed before him. The man looked too tired to kill him, surely weighed down by the weight of Dimitri’s sins, his atrocities, wandering the streets and waiting for him. Dimitri had come to take him, to bring him on his journey. Just like the other ghosts, just like the monster in his weapon.

“Glenn?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> welcome to my wild ride of a dimilix demon au! thank you to my wonderful artist @kainiia on twitter and thank you to mo and anna for beta-reading, if you'd like to hear more about the fic feel free to leave a comment and a kudos, or come talk to me about it on twitter at @danivonfemblem!


	2. Summon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sylvain receives the Lance of Ruin, which the class of Garreg Mach discovers houses a powerful demon. Felix later finds a demon in his newly-acquired sword and the two of them decide to summon and help Felix make a pact with the demon inside.

_1180_

Felix was fussing about in his room as Sylvain sat on his bed, looking terribly stern for a man who loved nothing more than to cut the tension with an off-color joke.

Sylvain, the cause of the new wave of idiocy that swept the halls of Garreg Mach, his ridiculous Hero's Relic and his even bigger fool of a brother.

There had been rumors that the Hero's Relics were not only powered by the blood of a crest wielder, but by a mystical force that lived within each weapon, imbued by the Ten Heroes and Four Saints. If placed in the wrong hands, the spirits within the weapons would corrupt the wielder, who would become a servant to its whims for an eternity.

Sylvain's brother had somehow managed to steal the Lance of Ruin, transforming into a Demonic Beast right before their very eyes. They retrieved the lance after killing the beast, and soon after their debrief with Rhea, the professor passed the lance off to Sylvain. "Tread carefully," they said, their typically vacant look replaced with one that held a fraction more concern. "The spirit in here is dangerous." The professor then proceeded to pile five mysteriously heavy books into Sylvain's arms, each one detailing how to handle the monster in the weapon and sent him off on his way.

Felix didn’t need to ask Sylvain about the terror he felt as he faced off against his brother, familiar old jeers manipulated into roars from the beastly transformation. Sylvain told Felix he stashed the thing in his room, obscuring it from view to avoid complaints from women who warmed his bed at night.

"Do you think our parents have been keeping all this a secret, Felix?" Sylvain said in a low tone as they passed by one another one morning on the way to class. "I don't think I've ever read about demons in Relic Weapons before."

Felix rolled his eyes, ripping a chunk out of some bread he pilfered from the dining hall. "Since when have you cared enough to read?" A flash of something a more observant person would have called hurt flashed behind Sylvain’s eyes before he brushed it aside, pushing playfully at Felix’s shoulder only for Felix to shove back.

"I read things that matter. Anyway, you should come up to my room later. I'll show you all the garbage I went through to wake this bad boy up."

Normally, Felix would have quipped at Sylvain for expecting him to go to his room when he had better things to do, but this was important. Not that he expected the Aegis Shield to leave the Fraldarius armory any time soon, but if he wanted to get stronger, he would need to figure out the best method of handling the demons inside their weapons.

Sylvain had handed him some surprisingly detailed notes that night, but they ended up shoved someplace Felix couldn’t remember as he went off to do more important things. Surely any notes Sylvain provided wouldn’t be much use compared to dealing with the real thing.

Felix was out at the training grounds, testing a new sword in his grip that he purchased from one of the traveling merchants. Dimitri was mulling about, which would have been more annoying if Felix hadn't been so busy with his own business. Felix swung the sword in a long arc, falling into a defensive stance when he heard Dimitri make a noise of surprise and jog over to him.

"Felix, may I --"

"Absolutely not." Felix yanked the sword back before Dimitri had a chance to lay his brutish hands on it. "I only bought this today, I refuse to let you break it."

Dimitri colored, scratching the back of his head. "Felix, that was only one time. And they were practice swords, not real ones."

Felix's sneer didn't fade, still holding the blade out of arm's reach. Dimitri looked at the hilt closely and his eyes lit up.

"I knew it!"

Felix, not wanting to be out of the loop, slowly brought the sword back down. "Knew what?"

"That is a sword made by Zoltan, a master blacksmith. Those are very rare, Felix."

Felix huffed, rolling his eyes. "I knew that." He did not know that. He simply liked the make of the sword and bought it without a second thought. Dimitri's gauntleted hands reached closer, Felix reflexively bringing it closer to his body.

"You know, Felix," Dimitri began, folding his hands in front of himself. "I would check that sword for malicious spirits. The Professor mentioned all sorts of weapons could have spirits trapped inside. Go meet with them, they'll let you know." Felix brought the flat of the blade to his face, turning it over in curiosity. It looked like any other sword. It seemed like a foolish notion, but the idea of having one of the only other possessed weapons in Garreg Mach was tantalizing.

"Fine. I'll speak with them tonight."

"Thank you, Felix."

Felix didn’t bother with a response, sheathing his weapon and leaving the grounds. No need for niceties with an animal masquerading as a man.

Felix knocked on the door of the Professor's quarters, opening with a quiet creak. Byleth was sitting and writing in a journal, completely unaware of Felix's presence. He waited a few beats before clearing his throat to announce himself.

"Professor."

They didn't flinch at the intrusion, only swivelling in their chair to face him. "Felix. You are not usually one to visit me." Felix made a quiet noise of recognition and Byleth looked at him with those big, soul-searching eyes.

Felix withdrew the blade and put it on their desk. "Our Boar Prince seems to suspect this sword may be holding a demon. It is crafted by a famous swordsmith from Faerghus. He instructed me to bring it to you." Byleth scanned the weapon, running a finger from tip to hilt, pausing at the insignia carved into polished wood.

"Hold on." Their face went stone cold, muttering something under their breath. The sword rattled, and Byleth's breath caught in their throat. "He was right."

Felix leaned in close, an interested glint catching in his eye. "What do I do?" Felix tried to search their expression for an answer. The professor only folded their arms and nodded.

"Sylvain has his family’s lance, right? He should be able to help you."

Felix tried not to voice his displeasure at the prospect as he pulled the sword back and turned it in his hands a few times. Before he had a chance to leave and make his way back to his quarters, Byleth placed a hand on his arm and gave him a concerned squeeze.

"I did not wake whatever was in there, I only sent a probe to see if anything slept in the sword. I could not tell for sure, but that is not a spirit to take lightly. Be careful." Felix was surprised at the sudden wordiness of their usually stoic professor, but appreciated the words of advice nonetheless.

"All right. I'll talk to Sylvain."

Which brought him back to his room, all of his possessions pushed into its corners as he worked on drawing a massive protection circle on the floorboards.

Sylvain was perched on the bed, shoved up against the back wall as he watched Felix with rapt attention. The Lance of Ruin sat on his lap, twitching and providing the room with a faint orange glow. Sylvain said he spoke to the demon, Glasya-Labolas, who also confirmed the presence within the blade. The sword laid on the ground across from Felix in a triangle drawn in chalk, a black mirror propped up on his desk chair in the center.

“The triangle keeps the demon from leaving the sword and running wild, while the black mirror lets him appear to you in a way you can see”, Sylvain explained. "You can drop all the formalities once you've had your first meeting." He shrugged and drummed his fingers along the staff of the lance. "But if you don't do this right the first time, you're screwed."

Felix nodded at Sylvain’s instructions as he inscribed the various names and titles of the Goddess that would keep him safe, another layer of protection.

He had foggy memories from childhood of his father talking to him about his brother bonding with the Aegis Shield. The shield would remain by his side to protect the King until it was Felix’s time to take up his place as the King’s right hand, the sort of nonsense Felix pushed out of his mind. His father never told him exactly what any of that meant; he only remembered being excited for when the shield would be his. Glenn showed it to him, attached to the back of his armor, leaving Felix’s young face awash with the relic’s glow as he gasped in amazement.

It all seemed so childish as he tried not to let his hand shake as he finished the inscription on his floor.

He was surrounded by a white circle drawn in chalk, a larger concentric circle filled with prayers and words of the Goddess. Sylvain had helpfully brought a few candles to place around the circles, along with a vial of scented oil. He pulled one of the loose papers that Sylvain had written notes on, clearing his suddenly dry throat as he got ready to begin. From his place on the bed, Sylvain gripped his lance and muttered something under his breath, his gaze going dark.

“Empowered by the holy light of the Goddess, I request your presence.” Felix began, hoping his voice wasn’t quivering with the fear he suddenly felt in every nerve ending. “The Goddess protects me, in a circle I have drawn in Her name. You have been confined, be it by your own choosing or by the choice of man, and I request you wake from your sleep and speak with me.” Felix swallowed, the candlelight directly in front of him jumping and flickering. He had coated the base of the candle in the pungent oil, as some sort of anchor in the physical world.

The sword rattled. The black of the mirror rippled. Felix’s eyes squeezed shut and he prayed he wouldn’t shout in fright.

A ghostly white hand reached out of the mirror, gripping the gilded edge and _pulling_. Another arm appeared as an entire body snaked out of the mirror. Felix opened his eyes and saw what looked like a strange man sitting in the chair the mirror had been placed on, the black mirror now nestled in his lap. His skin was porcelain white, long, jet black hair covering his bare body in a thick curtain. One arm rested on the top of the mirror while the other arm hung loose at his side.

His eyes glowed red, his face neutral. Felix met the expression, giving his best authoritative look.

“State your name.”

The demon stirred, his eyes falling on Felix. “Andras.” He drummed his fingers along the top of the mirror, turning to face Sylvain. “I see you brought backup.”

Sylvain bared his teeth, an action so wholly unlike him that made Felix more nervous than the demon in front of him did. He noticed the red light behind Sylvain’s eyes and decided to wrench his own attention away to bring the demon back to face him, clicking his tongue in annoyance.

“You are not here for him.”

Andras leaned back, a slow grin appearing on his face. “Are you familiar with me?” Felix answered with a shake of his head. “A pity.” The free hand reached outwards, the invisible barrier around the triangle glowing white as it hit his finger. “Normally, I would kill you and be done with this,” he said with an unimpressed lilt in his voice, “but I am feeling rather merciful today. I have been sleeping peacefully for quite a long time.” He glanced back at Sylvain and smiled, leaning towards him in the chair.

“It's been ages since I’ve seen you last.”

Sylvain growled, the Lance of Ruin twitching and spinning its vertebrae. Andras laughed and shook his head. “Always posturing. So typical.”

Felix felt the tension slip as he gave a smirk of his own. “It seems you already know him well.” Andras brought a hand to his mouth and chuckled, pushing some of the long hair from his face.

“May I taste you before we converse further?”

Felix grabbed the goblet that was sitting with him in the circle, pulling a dagger from his belt and holding it to his palm. He took a deep breath before beginning the incantation. “To bond oneself, man to demon, I offer a small sacrifice. My body for yours.” The blade pressed into his palm, wincing as he broke skin. He held his palm over the goblet and squeezed, getting a few good drops from his hand. He pressed the wound shut to stave off any more blood and pushed the goblet out with his foot, careful not to break the circle.

Andras leaned down and grabbed the goblet, placing his finger in and withdrawing it, the few drops of blood stuck to the tip of his pointer. He flicked a tongue out to taste, thin and pointed. His gaze fell back on Felix and his grin spread.

“Very powerful. Oh, I am thrilled.” He leaned down and took the sword in his hand, pointing it to Felix. Sylvain stood and Andras gave a pointed shake of his head. “Sit. I am not going to harm him. You have my word.” Sylvain didn’t budge. Andras cleared his throat and rolled his eyes. “As your friend knows, the next step in this process requires more vulnerability than you have provided me. If we are to make a pact, you need to come with me.” Felix got up and shot Sylvain a glare, the normal hue of his eyes reappearing as his posture adjusted, the concern in the curve of his shoulders prompting Felix to roll his eyes.

“I’ll be fine. You know I will be.”

Sylvain folded his arms and fell back onto his seat, tossing the lance to the other end of the bed. “Fine, fine. You’re in like, way over your head, but whatever. You’re probably right.” Felix was more annoyed that Sylvain didn’t trust him than any wager the demon demanded, but he didn’t have time to argue with him.

"What are your conditions."

Andras stood up, clothes materializing as he placed the mirror back on the chair. He wore a simple black robe, turning the sword over in his grip. "I'll bring us to a place where we can spar. If I win, you join my legion. If I lose, I forge your pact. Sound interesting enough?"

Sylvain's brow furrowed as he spoke up. "I changed my mind, this is a really shitty idea Felix -"

"Shut up." He snapped back, Sylvain frowning at him. "I agree to your terms. Except -" he took a deep breath and looked at Andras.

"I need more specifics. I don't intend to fight you with my fists if I do not have to."

Andras hummed, his smile turning wild. "Oh, we have a barterer here! Well, I applaud your common sense. It will be sword against sword. You can come at me with whatever other tools you have in your arsenal." He spread his arms as much as the triangle would allow in a show of submission. "Do you accept, Felix?"

It was dangerous for a demon to know his name, Felix knew that much. Sylvain was an idiot and blurted it out before the pact was official. He'd tell him off for that later, if he didn't die in whatever hellscape this demon dragged him to for their sparring match.

"I accept."

Felix extended the cut hand from the confines of the circle, leaning into Andras' space. The demon clasped Felix's hand in his own and the two disappeared from the room. Sylvain leaned against the wall and covered his face with his hands. "Shit."

* * *

Felix opened his eyes and found himself in an entirely white room, the walls stretching on endlessly. He swiveled his head around, trying to locate the demon that brought him here. “Show yourself.”

He looked down to find his reinforced steel sword in hand. The sound of footsteps reverberated through the room, Andras appearing from nowhere with the Sword of Zoltan. The demon’s black hair was bone straight and hung down to his waist, partially obstructing his vision. Felix idly wondered how anyone could fight with their hair down. He soon realized he had no time to think about such trivial things as Andras seemed to disappear from his vision, reappearing inches from his face with his blade poised to strike. Felix brought his sword up to block and grit his teeth from the force of the blow.

This was just like every other sparring match he had, Felix told himself. At each slash of the demon’s blade, he threw himself into each block. His stance didn’t falter, waiting for an opening to strike.

“Tell me about yourself, Felix.”

Andras’ mouth didn’t open as the voice echoed in Felix’s skull. Felix hissed as he pushed back, swinging his arm down in a wide arc. Andras caught it easily and sidestepped, Felix recovering before he could fall out of his stance. “I didn’t come here to talk,” Felix spat as he began to fight back. Andras didn’t seem to falter, their blades crashing together at each swing.

“That’s fine. I’ll just guess.”

Felix growled and broke their stalemate with a shoulder into Andras’ chest. It connected, pushing the demon back a step. Felix took the opening and brought his blade down vertically as Andras bent backwards to avoid being split down the middle. He was now bent almost entirely in half, Felix’s blade halting as it was inches above his stomach.

“You fight like a man who has something to hide. We are going to have to be close, Felix.”

He disappeared again, reappearing behind Felix and pulling him into a tight hold, hugging Felix close to his chest. Felix scrambled and braced himself, running through grapple techniques in his mind as fast as he could process. With his feet still on the ground, Felix pushed down and put all of his weight into his legs, pulling himself forward. Andras was now on his back, his hold loosening enough for Felix to snake his arms around Andras’ neck and flip him off his body. The sword of Zoltan was gone, Andras now laying on his back and laughing.

“What are you trying to prove, Felix? You are no weakling.”

He was gone again, materializing in front of Felix as he leaned on the sword and glanced up at him with his one visible eye.

“Who thought you were weak, Felix? Who are you trying to prove wrong?”

Felix growled and ran towards him, but Andras evaporated like mist as the sword slashed through his body. He let out a frustrated yell and whipped his head around, searching for his enemy. “I am not here to talk, shut up and fight me!”

Andras was behind him again, but made no move to restrain him.

“Parents? Siblings? A rival? A lover?”

Felix sent his elbow back, feeling it connect for a split second before Andras disappeared.

“Oh my, all of them? You’ve got some problems to work out, Felix.” Laughter reverberated around the endless room and Felix’s entire body tensed.

He fell to the ground hard as he looked up to find Andras sitting on his chest. Huge black raven wings appeared, cloaking the two in darkness. Felix turned his head to see the sword the demon held buried in the ground inches from his cheek.

“Here’s what I’ve gathered. Tell me how I did. You’re the youngest, obviously, and your older sibling - brother, I’ll wager - was the golden child. The best at everything. You loved him, but something happened. He’s dead, or gone, or just doesn’t love you anymore - and your father doesn’t look at you the way he ever looked at him. You hate it, it makes your blood boil.” Felix couldn’t respond, the weight on his chest crushing the breath from his lungs. “And to top it all off,” Andras said as he threw his hand away in an exaggerated gesture, “you had some kind of puppy love, and it all went to shit. You think you are impossibly weak to all of those people.”

Felix stopped thinking. His blood burned in his veins and pumped unnatural strength into every muscle in his body. He reached a hand up and yanked hard on Andras’ hair, bringing his head down close enough for Felix to slam their foreheads together with a show of force, sending the demon sprawling off his chest. Felix stood up slowly, pulling the sword of Zoltan out of the ground and walking towards Andras.

“You’re wrong.”

“Am I? Enlighten me, Felix.”

Felix pointed the blade at Andras’ neck, his eyes dark. Andras grinned and coiled each of his fingers around the tip, pushing it against his skin with a fierce desire in his eyes.

The words that left Felix’s mouth felt like smoke leaving his body, his anger and determination and fear all coalesced into a string of words that he couldn’t hear. Once the words were gone, forcibly removed from his body, Felix felt lighter, stronger. Andras knew his secret, a necessary sacrifice. As soon as the sound of his voice returned to his body, he pushed the blade to Andras’ throat harder, enough to break the skin.

“I have no time for games. If you do not intend to help me get stronger, then you are wasting my time.” Felix dropped the sword and let it clatter to the ground, Andras nodding and giving Felix a slow, warm smile.

Felix blinked once and found himself back in his room, his head spinning. Sylvain bolted upright, leaning forward on the mattress. “You’re -- You’re okay?” Felix nodded, every action weighing down his body. Andras reappeared in the chair, lounging comfortably and yawning into the back of his hand.

“He’s fine, Glasya. Relax. I told you I wouldn’t hurt him.”

The Lance of Ruin twitched, but Sylvain seemed to be the one present, for the moment. He left the bed and rushed to Felix’s side, swallowing hard and looking at him with worry painted across his face. The two sat together in the circle, Sylvain’s hands shaking in his lap with the urge to console, hold, anything. Felix looked listlessly out towards the demon.

“The pact.”

Andras nodded, scratching idly at his neck. Dried blood scraped off onto his fingers. “A deal’s a deal.” Felix got up, Sylvain watching as he left the confines of the circle, using his foot to smudge the lines of the triangle. Andras let out a pleased exhale and stood up, towering a full head and a half over Felix. “Where do you want the sigil?” Felix hadn’t thought about that. A mark, a way for others to know who he belonged to, who belonged to him.

“Does it matter?”

“Not really.” Andras grinned, his fingers giving off a light glow. “Just pick a spot.”

Felix held out his hand and pushed back his sleeve, exposing his left wrist. Andras’ hand covered it and Felix had to bite back a scream at the sudden wash of pain coursing through his already tired body. He felt boneless, ready to collapse at any moment, but Andras’ grip was deathly tight, and kept Felix rooted to the spot. He felt tired, so tired, and then everything shifted. All of his senses woke up as his exhaustion disappeared, spinning his wrist around and grasping Andras’, holding on tight. He winced and did his bed to hide it with a smirk. “You get to leave a sigil of your own?” Andras asked, head cocked to one side, “how touching.”

They pulled their hands away at the same time, holding their wrists out to one another. On Felix’s wrist, Andras’ sigil burned into the skin, a series of numbers, lines, and arrows with Andras’s name surrounding it in capital letters. On Andras’s wrist, the crest of Fraldarius stood proudly on raised skin.

“From this point on, you and I will work together,” Felix said with conviction. Andras nodded and handed him the sword, their hands overlapping at the hilt. “You will help me grow stronger.”

“And in return,” Andras replied as his hand left the sword, cupping Felix’s cheek instead. Felix frowned and knocked his hand away with the back of his own. “You will feed my bloodlust. You will fight on the battlefield for me, and will kill for me. I am strongest when I work alone, so I ask that you try to fight with others as little as possible.” He winked at Sylvain, who frowned and folded his arms. “I do not like sharing.”

“Deal.”

Andras smiled once last time, getting onto one knee and kissing the back of Felix’s hand.

“I, Andras of the Infernal Below, do pledge my fealty to you, and offer you my strength in return for yours, payment for waking me from my deep slumber and passing my test.” He stood back up and brushed himself off. “I will see you again when you next call for me, Felix.”

And with that, he vanished.

Sylvain exhaled noisily and raked his hands through his hair, looking at Felix with panic and concern. “You’re crazy. I’m supposed to be the reckless one making crazy pacts and almost getting myself killed, not you.”

Felix smirked and fastened the new sword to his belt, making a good show of looking calm and collected. “You have no faith in me, Gautier. I was never going to lose in a fight to some demon.”

Sylvain planted a hand on his shoulder and gave it a squeeze. “Just don’t go forgetting our promise.”

“I won’t. Now leave or help me clean up.”

A smile finally worked its way back onto Sylvain’s face, folding his arms back behind his head. “All right. I’ll get the desk, you get the bed.”

* * *

“So how did it go?” Dimitri found Felix at the training ground, like always. Felix sneered and buckled the large sword back into his belt.

“Fine. I have a demon at my command now.”

“Oh, Felix, that is wonderful to hear! You must tell me everything.” Dimitri came in close with his puppy dog expression, the murder and wildness of his true nature safely tucked away.

“I do not have to tell you anything.” Felix folded his arms and tapped his foot impatiently. “Leave, Boar, let me resume my training.”

Dimitri deflated, wide shoulders sagging in around him while those impossibly blue eyes pretending to look hurt and dejected. “If you say so. If you do want to talk, you know where to find me. Anything you have to share, I’m happy to listen. I am the house leader, after all.” He looked like he had more to say, but instead he chewed on his lip and looked to the doors of the training ground. “I am glad you’re safe, Felix.”

“Get out of my sight.”

Dimitri nodded, looking at him one final time in an attempt to bludgeon Felix to death with the sadness he emanated from every pore before leaving Felix in peace.

_So it’s him, huh?_

Felix nearly yelled in shock as Andras’s voice echoed in his mind. _He’s the one you want to protect?_

“Yes,” he answered simply. “Someone must handle the beast. And I am the only one who knows him well enough to know how to contain him.”

He resumed his practice with the sword, Andras watching in silence from behind his eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> art by the lovely @kainiia on twitter!
> 
> welcome to my wild ride of a dimilix demon au! thank you to my wonderful artist @kainiia on twitter and thank you to mo and anna for beta-reading, if you'd like to hear more about the fic feel free to leave a comment and a kudos, or come talk to me about it on twitter at @danivonfemblem!


	3. Forgotten

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A day in the abandoned Monastery with Glenn and Dimitri.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> quick content warning for this chapter for suicidal thoughts, dehumanization, and some light gore descriptions.

_1185_

Glenn woke up as he did every morning: grumbling and rubbing the sleep from his eyes as the sun came through the hole in the wall he deemed too small to be a nuisance and too large to call a window. Monastery living was an adjustment, a callback to his own days there well over a decade ago. Garreg Mach was a shell of its former self, and they were forced to step around rubble and debris from a battle that raged on years ago. Glenn and Dimitri had been at the Monastery for a few months now that Dimitri abruptly finished his bloody rampage through what was once Kingdom territory. Why they stopped was a mystery, but Dimitri rarely had anything of value to share with him. Dimitri treated him like an unruly shadow come to life, a spectre of his past that he wanted extinguished.

Glenn felt less than human as Dimitri bickered and argued with him on his very existence.

Meanwhile, Dimitri seemed to be anything but human. He went days without a word, stumbling through lucidity with little more than a mumble and a glassy, soulless look in his single eye. Glenn watched Dimitri skewer a rat and eat it live, stomached the stench of old blood that clung to his armor, stood back as Dimitri let his eye fill with disease and decay only for him to remove it with a clawed gauntlet and a single, unimpressed grunt.

A normal, sane person would have left years ago. They would have seen Dimitri in such a sad, decrepit state that same day Glenn had found him in the marketplace and assumed he was some madman. Glenn felt tied to him in a way he couldn’t understand, held to a bond that demanded he remain by Dimitri’s side until he perished.

When Dimitri found Glenn in the marketplace and uttered his name, a missing puzzle piece slid into place where there had once been only emptiness in his mind.

_You worked through your sword forms in a wide open space. To your left, a man sat and watched, nodding quietly along and mouthing the names to each movement. When he finished, the man ran up and knelt down to your level, holding both of your hands in his own. Glenn could not see his face, but he could feel his smile. “That was wonderful, Glenn,” he said, a kindness in his voice. “You’ll be a great XXXX some day.” You embraced him, the little wooden sword clattering to the ground by your side. The man hugged you in return and whispered something else, like warmth against your ears. “Your XXXX would be so proud.”_

Glenn.

The name “Glenn” had been the key to opening a door long since bolted shut by whatever nearly killed him all those years ago. He woke up by himself in a thick forest he hadn’t recognized, freshly born and without a single memory to tell him where to go next. He didn’t know who he was, where he came from, or what he was supposed to be doing. He spent some time piecing together a fresh identity, a name that didn’t fit but was passable enough. Once he was able to figure out the next logical steps to take as a new man living a life that should have been taken from him, he joined a small mercenary crew and worked throughout the Kingdom. Garrett had been able to lead a normal, albeit incorrect life, yet when a half-crazed, half-dead man reached for him and uttered the name “Glenn”, he had no choice but to follow.

Glenn spent his mornings cleaning and reorganizing, training and taking care of the few living things that still came through the Monastery. Dimitri never bothered, and some part of Glenn felt a need for things to look presentable, despite the fact that only the two of them were ever present. Keeping himself busy meant he didn’t have to ask himself questions like whether four years following Dimitri was the right choice. And it kept him away from Dimitri’s less than friendly demeanor.

Glenn could have lived like Dimitri if he wanted - silent, motionless, only coming out to reveal the spirit barely caged within - but Glenn was hanging on to sanity by his fingernails. At this point, he wasn’t sure if two mad men could accomplish more than one madman and another desperately trying to keep them both safe. Or perhaps he had already lost all common sense, his personhood left back in Fhirdiad when he signed his life away.

He needed to get out of his room. Too little movement, too much thinking.

He looked to the sword on his bed, frowning at it as he put his hair up with the leather cord he kept around his wrist. The sword was a hand and a half wide, branded with the Crest of Chevalier and squared off at the end. A sword that was his, that much he knew for sure - but he rarely could bring himself to remove it from its sheath. The Sword of Moralta held healing properties, which he was assured by the demon who lived inside it was the only thing that kept him from dying on that fateful day. It only kept him stable; he likely would have died from infection in a week were it not for such a kind demon, supposedly indebted to Glenn for waking him from his slumber.

The answer never made sense to him. What made Glenn so special? Why had he been kept alive? To serve as Dimitri’s servant? The demon could have taken his body and locked his own soul away, and yet he left Glenn like this - his mind wiped clean as he picked up whatever pieces he could find to figure out who he was. Too much was lost as Glenn was handed his name and a man whose presence demanded he serve, the rest still a mystery to him.

Glenn grabbed them some breakfast - a few pheasants he took down that took up residence around the Monastery - and made his way to the Cathedral. Dimitri was always here, waiting. Glenn had fashioned a small cooking area, should Dimitri ever decide he wanted to enjoy a fresh cooked meal again. Glenn sat in silence as he prepared his meal, all while Dimitri cut a monstrous figure in the far corner of the Cathedral, dark and brooding.

Glenn ate his breakfast alone, just as he did every morning. He stripped the pheasants bare and cooked each one, wrapping the food he hadn’t finished and putting them someplace Dimitri could have them. Just in case. If not, Glenn would finish the birds before they went bad. Once the birds were stored, he could deal with Dimitri.

Glenn cleared his throat as he stared down the bright blue of his cloak, waiting to see if today he would bother answering. “I’m heading out to patrol,” he said to the man’s back. “Come with me.” Dimitri shifted, turning to glare at him with his one good eye. Glenn was on his timetable, forced to make his life revolve around a man whose goals were insurmountable with moods that could never be predicted. He was dangerous and could likely kill Glenn without breaking a sweat. But no matter how much they screamed at each other, Dimitri’s crazed ramblings or Glenn’s worn down patience, Dimitri had yet to try. Perhaps Dimitri believed he truly was a ghost, unkillable by mortal hands. Each day passed and Glenn couldn’t be sure if Dimitri made the right or wrong assessment, his hands feeling see through on the days he looked at himself.

The silence was broken as Dimitri muttered under his breath and shuffled to retrieve his weapon, following along without another word. At least he would move today.

Glenn hated guiding Dimitri around, dragging him out of the Cathedral on a leash for his mandated walk around the Monastery. He hated knowing that it was Dimitri who held his leash, who tugged it whenever Glenn wanted to escape. He wanted to leave, wanted to go back to being nothing. Nothing didn’t make him pine for an existence he hadn’t known, or crave to protect a man he couldn’t understand. Glenn wished he could pilot his own destiny instead of watching someone else hold it in their hands as he waited for their next move.

 _He is important_ , a familiar voice whispered in his ear. Glenn’s fist tightened at his side as they left the Monastery to begin their patrol. _You are destined to serve him._

Why? Why did it matter who Glenn was destined to serve? How much suffering did he have to go through to learn who Dimitri even was? Dimitri never bothered to tell him, only answering as “a corpse” or “no one”. How Glenn envied those answers, how he craved to be only a corpse.

The single memory Glenn held of the man in front of him floated to the surface, melting the ice around his heart.

_He was smaller. He smiled, clashing wooden weapons with you. He fell back as you pointed the sword at his throat. He laughed and rubbed his side. “You win again. I will get you next time, right after you teach me how to do that.” Another boy rushed forward, barely there._

_“You better not have hurt him!” The child shouted, hugging him closer._

_“He’ll be fine, XXXX,” you assured him._

_Dimitri looked up at you and patted the child’s - head? Shoulder? - and kissed there soon after, sweet and boyish. “It’s all right. Glenn wouldn’t hurt me.”_

Glenn wouldn’t hurt him. He had considered it, briefly. His body seemed to halt him every time, the blood in his veins holding more memory than his mind held anymore.

His thoughts were interrupted as Dimitri spoke up.

“Keep up, ghost.” Dimitri didn’t bother to turn around, but the sour expression was clear in his tone. “Otherwise, I will leave you here.” He picked up his pace, as if expecting Glenn to give chase. He would, Goddess damn it all he would chase this man to the ends of the damned earth, but Glenn kept his mouth shut.

Four years tied to this man’s side, unable to get answers, unable to be human, trapped in a ghost’s body. The longer they walked, the more Glenn felt himself drifting from side to side. What more could he give to this stranger, who knew him more intimately than he knew himself?

“Dimitri.” Glenn’s voice cut through the silence, and for a moment Dimitri paused. He stood his ground as Glenn stared at the lion of Fhirdiad emblazoned on Dimitri’s cloak. The image stirred something in him, a piece in the back of his mind that screamed this is home. He reached out and fisted the navy blue fabric and gave a tug. “Face me.”

Dimitri turned and looked confused, his eye adjusting to the man in front of him. He looked lost, struggling to see Glenn for what he was. Struggling to see Glenn at all. Glenn let out a shaky exhale and stepped closer. “When will we resume our search for the Emperor?” Nothing. He moved closer still, holding his fist covered cloak up between them. The lion was distorted in his grasp, a confusing mix of blacks and blues spun between them. “I have sworn to stay by your side, and we have not moved from Garreg Mach. It is high time we resume our hunt, unless you intend to let our bodies atrophy and end up among the rubble with the rest of the Monastery.”

Dimitri shook his head, his eye thick and watery. “Felix, I --”

Felix?

Glenn let go of the cloak, losing all feeling in his fingers and his face. The cold in his bones returned in full force, freezing every limb in his body in seconds. Felix, Felix, _Felix_ , it sounded so real. He could hear it in a thousand different voices, all shouting around him. Glenn failed to notice Dimitri closing in on him, cupping his cheeks with both hands. “I will kill her for you. She is the one who did this to me. I’ll give you back the boy you loved. The monster dies when she does, I promise.”

Glenn wanted to get away. He couldn’t move, his back pressed up against a tree. Dimitri came in closer, closer still, and Glenn’s face twisted as he grabbed a dagger from his belt and pressed it to Dimitri’s neck. “Who is Felix?” Glenn demanded, the dagger pressed against the soft flesh of his throat. “Tell me!”

Dimitri’s mood shifted again, leaning closer as the dagger began to cut into his skin. The blood started slow, thick ruby droplets clinging to the blade before dripping down to settle in his armor. “It seems I was mistaken.” Glenn pulled the dagger back, the wound far too shallow to be life threatening. He tried to put it back in its sheath, unable to steady his hand as it fell worthlessly into the dirt by their feet. “You are not Felix. Only a cruel imitation of him, just as you are a cruel imitation of Glenn.” He walked away, leaving Glenn shaken and confused.

“Please,” he begged, “just tell me who he is.”

Dimitri looked out into the thick forest. “He is your brother.”

The memory that slammed into Glenn’s body was enough to throw him off balance, only just catching himself before he fell to the ground.

_You watched him run up to you, eyes thick with unshed tears. He was so small. He was the first person you ever swore to protect. Even before Dimitri. He wrapped his arms around your knees, the thick bubble of a sob breaking free. “You promise you’ll write to me every day?”_

_You smiled and pat his head. “I won’t have much to tell you if I write every day. I’ll be very busy training to be a knight.”_

_He sobbed again, his whole body shaking from the force of it. “You can train here, with me and XXXX,” he said, an argument you’d heard many times before. “I’m going to come see you every time XXXX goes to the capital.” You tried to warn him - you’d be very busy as a XXXX, you wouldn’t have time to make sure your little brother wasn’t getting into trouble. But he was insistent, and you scooped him up in your arms and promised - a letter a day, and you would practice with him whenever he came to the capital._

And Glenn forgot him.

Dimitri left Glenn to the new fragment of his memory, moving deeper into the forest. “We have visitors,” he said in a low tone, retrieving his lance from his back. Glenn tried to shake off the last of the memory as he followed after Dimitri, the dagger abandoned on the ground. He could hear it now - the muttering of another voice coming closer, chastising their traveling partner.

“I don’t know why you wear that armor everywhere, you have no chance of going anywhere stealthily --”

“I’m not trying to be stealthy, stealthy is your thing --”

“Shut up, I can hear someone up ahead. Be on your guard.”

Dimitri and Glenn both paused as they came to a small clearing, two figures coming into view. A man with bright red hair covered from the neck down in burnished steel armor, another man dressed in varying shades of teal. Dimitri recognized them immediately and stepped forward, blowing their cover completely. Glenn tried not to sympathize too much with the one in teal, unable to pull him back fast enough before he appeared in full view, startling the two into silence.

“Your Highness?”

“You …”

The one in teal pulled out a weapon, encouraging Glenn to appear as well. The man in armor looked at them both like ghosts as he took a few steps out of the fray. “Holy shit,” he whispered, trying to pull the other back with him.

The man in teal didn’t budge. If anything, he steeled his resolve further.

Dimitri spoke up first, gazing coldly down at their attacker. “Everywhere I go, you always follow. It was only a matter of time before you found me.”

Glenn looked up at Dimitri, then back at the other man.

Who was he?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> welcome to my wild ride of a dimilix demon au! thank you to my wonderful artist @kainiia on twitter and thank you to mo and anna for beta-reading, if you'd like to hear more about the fic feel free to leave a comment and a kudos, or come talk to me about it on twitter at @danivonfemblem!


	4. Reunion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Felix has to face Dimitri, a man who has been considered dead for the past five years, and his brother Glenn, who has been considered dead for the past nine. He handles it about as well as you'd expect.

Five years.

Felix searched for Dimitri for five long, painful years, his mind running ragged. He knew he wasn't dead, he knew it. No one else believed him-- everyone was so busy with this damned war. Felix could make time to find the boar. He would have known if he was really dead. Something in him was tied to the beast, forever keeping them within arm's reach of each other.

When he heard the news, he left the warfront. Sylvain was distraught, Ingrid was fuming. _You can’t just leave,_ they warned him. _You can’t do this alone_. Felix had been alone for the past five years. Friends, allies, who cared. Now that Dimitri was gone, none of them were willing to stay by his side anyway. They were cowards, the lot of them: too afraid to find the man who would one day rule their country, afraid of the beast who they heard whispers of rippling through Faerghus. He ripped through towns, crushing skulls in his bare hands and snarling like a monster. Felix knew. With every stone he turned, he knew he was getting closer. It was a stroke of luck that brought him to Garreg Mach. Sylvain had left Gautier to help him scout, making Felix promise that he wouldn’t do anything stupid.

Now he stared down Dimitri, who looked back with a startlingly placid expression. Felix wanted to scream, demand he explain himself - why avoid him for so long? Why had he kept himself hidden, without telling anyone? Felix’s teeth were bared, his blade out before he could make words form in his mouth.

Glenn stepped in between them. "What do you think you're doing?"

Glenn died when Felix was thirteen years old.

Felix didn’t see the death. Gruesome, he was told. The only thing left of his brother was his armor, strewn about the well-worn path to Duscur. His father kept the armor in some dusty room, left a flower on a pedestal and cried for his perfect knight son.

It all made Felix grind his teeth to dust. Glenn wasn’t perfect. He _died_. Perfect knight this, died of honor that-- it was pathetic. Everyone looked at him and saw an idealized version of his older brother. Glenn may have died that day, but it was Felix who disappeared. Instead, they crammed Glenn into Felix’s barely-teenage body and begged him to be what he had once been, begged him to be good, begged him to be perfect.

Glenn was alive, staring him down like an enemy. Felix didn't lower his blade.

"Don't think I'll go easy on you."

Glenn grit his teeth. "What business do you have with him?"

Felix barked an incredulous laugh, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. "What, did you crack your skull?" He wanted to jeer and poke further, but his throat closed up around the words. How do you ridicule the man who survived nine years of death? Who lived on in word and lived on in flesh too? Who abandoned Felix, Ingrid, Dimitri, Sylvain? He couldn’t say the words, couldn’t breathe life to the Tragedy that should have been the truth of him. Instead, they stood on the precipice of this beautiful lie, as Felix stared down the only man in his life he wanted to beat. His greatest rival, who he had been training day in and day out to one day defeat. The ghost who would never lift his sword again.

Glenn said nothing, his own weapon still at his hip.

Dimitri scoffed and turned to leave.

"Don't think I'm done with you yet! --"

In a flash, Glenn's weapon was out, cutting Felix off before he could chase after the Boar. Felix snarled, feeling power from his sword flood his veins. _Kill him_ , the voice whispered. _He's in your way. Strike him down_. Andras hungered for blood as Felix felt his muscles tense and flex, adding strength on top of his own.

 _I can't_ , Felix's mind answered. _Not until I get some answers_. Andras let out a reedy whine in his thoughts, the blade shuddering in his grip. Typical. The demon only bothered to help if he was slaying enemies; he hardly cared for conflict among brothers. Likely for the best, considering Felix intended to get to the bottom of this, not add a second corpse to the memory of his brother.

Glenn lowered his blade, brows furrowed. "You can't -- he isn't safe to approach." His shoulders sagged, a sadness in his eyes that Felix hadn't seen before. Nothing in Felix offered sympathy.

"What do you know?" Felix barked back. He ached to run after Dimitri, to bring him back. He had to. That was the whole purpose of this mission, the reason they were fighting this war. They needed Dimitri, no matter what state he was in. If the Beast roaming Faerghus was really him, they needed his unfettered power.

Felix needed him. For the war effort. Five years without Dimitri took a toll on his mind, searching and screaming and demanding he return. Felix would never say the words out loud, but he was desperate. He was trying to scrounge up hope in a world that was rapidly running out. Hope for Faerghus, and hope that the boar would come back. Hope that he could find what had been lost longer than five years ago, lost when his brother was too. It was a stupid dream, but he chased it all the same. Watching Dimitri walk away only hammered at the nail in his heart, hardening his rage against the one stopping him.

Glenn's sword point touched the ground. "I've been traveling with him for a few years now." A sigh parted his lips, his gaze downcast. "He's not … he's not human anymore."

Felix rolled his eyes. "What, because he walks on all fours? Does he bring down flying beasts with his teeth?" The world shrank to only three people, widening to four when he felt Sylvain’s hand on his shoulder. Felix started, looking at him with a fury in his eyes. Sylvain looked calm given the circumstances, hearing about his monstrous king and seeing an old friend. It wasn’t enough to shake Felix, only to give pause.

"Come on. Let's go back and tell the others that we found his Highness," Sylvain said, his voice heavy with concern.

Felix didn't turn away. He stepped out of Sylvain's touch and walked closer to Glenn, raising the sword to his neck. His eyes burned. Kill him, Andras repeated. Felix's muscles tightened. "You want me to walk away from you," Felix warned, pressing the blade harder into Glenn's neck. "You don't want to hear what I have to say."

Glenn remained still, eyes never moving from Felix. Felix stepped back and readied his blade. "Whatever you are now, you owe me a fight. Let me prove once and for all which of us is stronger." Glenn raised his sword from the ground slowly as they both counted down in their heads, an unspoken rule.

Their blades clashed in an instant, the roar of power in his veins pushing Felix forward. Every slash was met, every offensive push was successfully driven back. Felix's chest burned, the words spilling out of his mouth. "Of all the people who had to be here, it was you!"

Glenn jumped back after a heavy hit, Felix rushing after him. "You, the person who made all of this happen!" A heavy overhead swing as Glenn blocked with his blade. Felix stayed, pressing down with force. "You're why he became a monster!" Felix's blade slid off and Glenn moved back again, his stance wavering. "I saw him change in front of my eyes! I saw how delighted he was to kill! All because you had to go and die!" Felix's speed was inhuman, running towards Glenn and grabbing the sword with his hand, yanking Glenn towards him.

"You ruined everything. For all of us." Stray strands of hair stuck to his face with sweat, his eyes burning in their sockets. He was still the one fighting, Andras pushed into the far corners of his mind as he screamed for blood and death. The glow in his irises was his own, powered by years of fury. No demon could match his strength in this moment, no amount of power from his sword could enhance the rage he felt for the man in front of him.

Glenn yanked the sword back from Felix's grip. He didn't flinch as it sliced his palm. "I'm sorry."

Felix barked a laugh, balking at Glenn’s words. "You think that's enough to bring back the childhood you took? You think that'll make our father look at me like I'm not some cheap knockoff?"

Glenn dropped his sword. "Our … are you Felix?"

All of the fight left Felix in an instant, allowing for emptiness and cold to make its home in his marrow instead. "What kind of question is that?"

Felix took a step back, and then another. This wasn’t happening. This wasn’t _fucking_ happening. His own sword fell to the ground as he began to put the pieces together. Glenn wasn’t some hardened killer who treated Felix like he was another hit, unflinching and unfeeling when he saw his brother for the first time in almost a decade.

Glenn didn’t know who he was. Glenn had forgotten him.

He ran forward at blinding speed and tackled Glenn to the ground, pinning him in place. He met his long dead brother’s gaze and tried to speak around the sob that was sitting in his throat. “Of course I’m Felix, you fool! Who else could I be? Who else would bother to fight the ghost of their --” he choked around the word brother, his entire body convulsing. Glenn’s eyes softened, a pity he did not deserve to give him.

“Felix, I --”

“Shut up!” Felix covered his mouth, only growing more frustrated as he watched his tears hit Glenn’s cheeks and fall between his fingers. “You don’t get to talk if you don’t even know what you did to me! To all of us!” He gestured behind him, assuming Sylvain hadn’t turned tail and bolted as soon as he realized what was happening. They stayed there for seconds, minutes. Felix breathed hard over him, silent as he decided what was left to say to a brother who didn’t even know him.

“This is worse,” he muttered, sitting up and scrubbing at his face with the sleeve of his jacket. “This is worse than if you had just died. Now you can’t even answer for what you’ve done.” Even as he released Glenn from the pin, the other didn’t move. There was nowhere to go, nowhere Glenn could run. They both knew Dimitri could have left the continent and been on his way to fucking Albinea-- Felix would drag the animal right back if he had to. He didn’t stand, continuing to hover over Glenn as he waited for something to change. He waited for the thickness of this illusion to drop, to find out he had been fighting a shadow, or was waking up from some horrible nightmare. Nothing changed. His entire body shuddered as he suppressed another sob.

“What a dreadful way to talk to your brother.”

A new voice echoed around them as Felix’s hands impulsively balled up into fists. A wisp of smoke appeared, a tall echo of a man walking by them. He wore long robes, much like Andras’ own. Instead of charcoal black, they were a deep crimson, cutting a sharp figure as the demon crouched beside them both. He ran a hand through Glenn’s bangs, looking fondly at him. “Felix, you’ve become such a rude little man.”

Felix’s gaze turned hard as he stared down this new foe, the second blade at his hip aching to be drawn. “Oh yeah? And what do you know?”

The demon grinned, splitting his face in two. “Everything.”

Felix leaned back as the demon moved closer in, pulling a second sword from his belt and holding it up to defend himself. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“You know what I mean, Felix,” he answered easily, every movement like liquid smoke. The way he leaned forward, the drape of his hand across Glenn’s face, the way he stroked Felix’s blade. “Your not-so dearly departed brother is here because of a miracle.” He brought a hand back to his chest, swelling with pride. “And I am that miracle.” He tilted his head, the dangerous grin never once leaving his face. “I am Asmoday, local miracle worker, demon, whatever word you feel most comfortable with. You are Felix, Glenn’s only brother, second son to Rodrigue.” He glanced up at Sylvain. “You are Sylvain Gautier, second son of House Gautier.” He looked at him with consideration in his eyes, investigating the twitching lance that was clipped to his back. “And that would be your House’s demon. Congratulations, Sylvain.”

Felix got off Glenn, stepping back far enough to reach the sword of Zoltan. “What do you want with us then, demon? What sort of sick joke are you trying to play here?”

Asmoday stood in turn, taking up the sword of Moralta and turning it over in his hands. “What else could I possibly want? I have everything I could ever want from your big brother here.” He swung the sword in the air, testing the weight. “What do you want, Felix? Don’t you miss your brother?” He disappeared in a flash, reappearing to knock Felix’s sword too far out of reach. He got into a familiar stance - Glenn’s fighting stance. Felix felt sick. “Why don’t we have a little fight. You win, you can have your brother’s memories back. You lose, I take something of yours as well.” He licked his lips as Felix’s stomach churned.

He raised his second sword and set his jaw, hoping the tremor in his arm wasn’t visible. _Andras, if you want your blood so bad, now is the time._

Andras was uncharacteristically silent. Felix swallowed around nothing. Andras thrived on terrible odds, pushing Felix further and further until he was exhausted and surrounded by the bodies they slew. And yet, when faced with this demon, Andras hadn’t uttered a word.

It was Sylvain who found his voice first, the sound of armor creaking and noisy as he brought his hands to cup around his mouth. “Not a good idea, Felix!”

Felix wrinkled his nose, only defiant now as he was told no. He didn’t want to have this fight either, but did Sylvain only think he shouldn’t because he wasn’t strong enough? “Why not?”

“This isn’t some joke, Felix. If he kept Glenn alive, he’s …” he paused, looking away. “He’s dangerous. We need to get to his Highness anyway. We can’t get distracted.”

Felix turned away from Asmoday. Sylvain was right - the Boar was far more important. He sheathed his blade, walking to pick up and sheathe Andras’s weapon as well. “You overestimate how much I value the attention of a dead man,” Felix said, hollowness heavy in his words. “I don’t care anymore. You can keep him for all I care. He’s better dead than alive anyway.” Felix cast a final glance at Glenn, who was sitting up and looking just as lost and hurt as he had been before. “Do us both a favor and get lost.”

Asmoday shrugged. “Suit yourself.” With that, he vanished from sight, leaving only a small scorch on the ground as a reminder that he had been present in the first place.

Sylvain jogged up to where Felix was, curling an arm around his shoulder and lowering his voice. “Come on. He’s probably back at the Monastery.” Felix batted his arm away and walked past him as they both continued the last leg of their journey.

Glenn got up and brushed himself off and followed behind them, picking his sword up from where Asmoday dropped it on the way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope you enjoy yet another lovely art installment by @kainiia on twitter! love them endlessly, I am crying with Felix as I type this


	5. Confrontation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Felix and Sylvain try to figure out the best way to reach out to Dimitri.

All that time spent searching for Dimitri, and Felix couldn’t even speak to him.

He couldn’t just walk up to the Boar, demand an explanation, fight out his feelings and expect everything to go back to some semblance of normalcy. There was no normal left to return to, not five years ago and certainly not now. The Boar stood in the same place every day, gazing listlessly through a shattered hole in the stained glass window of the Monastery. Felix knew this because he would watch Dimitri stand there from a short distance away, a disgusted expression painted on his face. What a monster. What a wretched statue of a beast, no longer any scrap of humanity left in his body to cry out for food or drink or bath. How revolting.

So Felix stood there, too, unable to say a word to him.

Glenn told him - when Felix was willing to entertain him, which was rare at best - that Dimitri was possessed. There was no value in trying to reason with him because any reason he may have once held had been sacrificed to whatever demon lived inside Areadbhar. But Felix knew the truth of it. It was a bullshit excuse from a man who didn’t know the Boar like Felix knew him. Who had no idea that Dimitri had been like this for almost nine years now - a monster. An animal.

So Felix stood there.

Glenn gave up his post once Felix and Sylvain arrived, spending some time catching up with Sylvain instead of trying to coax Dimitri into various activities throughout the day. Felix wasn’t interested in whatever nonsense the two of them were up to - likely some overly sappy heart to heart about trying to get Glenn’s memories back. Felix didn’t care. He wasn’t here for a man who wasn’t his brother anymore. He was here for Dimitri. He was here for the Boar.

So Felix stood there. Waiting to be acknowledged.

That was what he wanted. That was what burned deep in his heart, deep in his gut. He wanted the blasted animal to turn around and fucking _say something_ to him. He wanted to hear Dimitri croak out some half baked apology, look at him with his one good eye and babble out that he never meant to leave Felix alone. A fool's fantasy, considering the Boar never spoke - nothing that sounded like human speech, at least. There were times in the day where Dimitri would crane his head a little higher up and whisper unintelligible nonsense to the ceiling. All it did was make Felix more upset - how dare Dimitri stand there, day in and day out, and refuse to acknowledge him? Did he lose his memories too, along with whatever common sense was wiped from his mind when he became a beast?

Felix let out a frustrated yell and turned towards the pillar, pulling out a dagger from a sheath at his hip to carve a jagged line into the marble. It joined six other lines, each one angrier than the last. Property damage did nothing to ease Felix’s sour mood, but it was somewhat satisfying to feel the metal slice through heavy stone. He couldn’t leave the dagger in Dimitri anyway, considering the bastard was covered head to toe in that infernal armor.

“What’cha doin?”

Felix looked past the pillar to see Sylvain, arms crossed and looking all too cocky as per usual. Felix put the knife back into his belt and looked away. “Nothing. What do you want.”

Sylvain huffed out a big sigh and closed the distance between them, his eyes on the black and blue lump of a King they were both supposed to bring back to their people. “Came to see if you’ve made any headway with his Highness.” Felix grunted in reply. Sylvain sighed again and threw an arm over his shoulders, tugging him into the cool metal of his armor. Felix was too annoyed to stop him.

“Damn,” he remarked, glancing down at Felix. “You must be really upset about this.” Ever the observant one, wasn’t he? Felix chewed on his lower lip, arms folded tightly over his chest. He didn’t want to have this conversation, least of all with Sylvain. Instead, he looked just past Dimitri at the broken stained glass he was so enamored with. An image that once depicted Seiros reaching out to Sothis, now with all of Seiros gone except the hand reaching up to her mother. Felix couldn't see what made it so special.

“Glenn’s doing better,” Sylvain said, filling the quiet in the Monastery with chatter. “I think he needed someone to talk to him, you know? Not, uh,” he gestured to Dimitri with his free hand, “trying to figure this out every day.” Felix made another annoyed grunt and finally threw Sylvain’s arm off him, turning to look up at the other man.

“You came here for a reason. What’s your aim?”

Sylvain shrugged, arms spread wide. “Only to see what you've been up to. According to the pillar, your face, and his Highness, I think we’re all in the same place we were when we started.”

Felix sneered, prepared for an argument. Of course Sylvain didn’t believe in him. “Why is it my job to take his leash? Is it some sort of Goddess-given Fraldarius duty to make sure someone takes His Royal Beastliness on his daily walk and scrubs the gore and viscera from his back?”

Sylvain wasn’t deterred by Felix’s words, expression, or much of anything. “No, but I do think you’re the best man to talk to him about all this. If anyone, it’s gotta be you.”

“Why?” Felix knew the answer. He didn’t need to ask Sylvain.

“You know him better than any of us,” Sylvain said, his voice soft as he took hold of Felix’s shoulders and brought him closer. “Maybe you can, I dunno, drum up some chummy story about the two of you as little rugrats chasing each other around the castle. Something to remind him he’s more than an Empire soldier killing machine.”

Felix sniffed loudly, dubious.

“I mean, you two knew each other since you were practically newborns. Better than me and Ingrid, by far. I remember coming down to Fhirdiad when you two were there, and you’d be crying and holding onto his Highness’s arm because he --”

“That’s enough, Sylvain,” Felix spat out, teeth bared. He knew. He knew he was the only man who could handle the Boar in his most monstrous state. As much as he despised it, he knew that Sylvain was right. They were bound by an unknown force, likely the reason behind why Felix spent so long chasing and searching and thinking of him when they were separated. Sylvain didn’t need a window into his childhood to know Felix was the man for the job.

“Come on, I cleaned up one of the dorm bedrooms. You, me, and Glenn can plan out how we can all pitch in and help out.” Sylvain turned Felix away from Dimitri with little trouble at all, patting his back twice before folding his hands behind his head and heading off in the direction of the dormitories.

Fine.

If they wanted Felix to talk to the Boar, he’d do it. They wouldn’t like it, but he’d do it.

* * *

Felix sat on the floor of his old dormitory room in the last remaining chalk lines of the summoning circle he drew all those years ago with Glenn in a chair at by desk and Sylvain on the bed, long since stripped of armor and down to a comfortable gambeson and trousers. Felix leaned back on his hands, eyes half lidded. “You,” he said as he looked to Glenn, who raised a brow in question. “What have you gotten out of the Boar?” Glenn tilted his head.

“He means his Highness,” Sylvain filled in.

“You call him a Boar?” Glenn said, face scrunched up in disbelief.

“It’s complicated,” Sylvain said.

“It’s not,” Felix answered quickly. “He’s an animal. You’ve seen it with your own eyes.” He looked to Sylvain, his gaze hard. “You can’t argue with me anymore. Dimitri is dead, and the Boar has been wearing his skin for practically a decade. You can see it now too, so I don’t want to hear any more nonsense about my _disrespect,_ ” Felix hissed out, the last word was spoken in a mocking tone with any remaining eye contact broken so he could grumble while staring at the wall.

Sylvain shrugged and turned to Glenn. “Well? You get anything out of his Highness?”

“No,” Glenn said, shifting uncomfortably in his seat. Sylvain was right - hardly a week passed and Glenn looked much less like the spectre that had been hovering around the Boar. His face was no longer ghastly pale, the dark circles under his eyes slowly diminishing. He looked almost human, lively. Felix’s stomach soured at the thought, reminding him of their similarities, of who Glenn was supposed to be. He bit his tongue and kept any eye contact to a minimum as Glenn continued. “His Highness doesn’t speak to me much, except to call me his ghost.” He looked down at the floor as Sylvain leaned over and patted his shoulder a few times.

“Yeah.” Sylvain’s voice was deep and empathetic, his brows drawn in. Felix was suffocated in their vicinity and could do nothing but huff and grind his teeth. “Anything at all? Any clues?”

“No.” Glenn gently brushed Sylvain’s hand from his shoulder, sitting up straight. “I believe his Highness has been possessed.” A theory he’d brought up before. Felix barked a laugh, both of them turning to face him.

“He’s not possessed,” Felix said.

Glenn folded his arms over the top of the chair, resting his chin on his forearms as he narrowed his eyes. “I’ve been with him for the past four years, Felix. Not once has he shown any sign of humanity in that time. We went from village to village as he ripped through Empire defenses with barely any food or sleep. I’d be surprised if his armor even came off, I’ve never seen him remove it. Whatever lives in that Relic Weapon of his, I think it’s long since taken over his mind, perhaps in exchange for power.”

Felix was unconvinced. He stood up and made his way to Glenn’s seat, poking his shoulder. “Don’t get all overconfident just because you’ve been nursing the Boar by yourself for a few years. I’ve been doing this far longer than you have.”

“Didn’t know it was a contest,” Sylvain said airily beside them both.

“Shut up,” both Fraldariuses answered. Sylvain held his hands up and backed off, letting the two create an unnecessary tension on their own.

Glenn remained in his seat, comfortable and undeterred. “So tell me, Felix. If you are the secret to cracking into his Highness’s impenetrable armor - which you say isn’t from some sort of possession - what is your plan of attack? What have you accomplished so far?”

Felix grit his teeth so hard that both men in the room heard them click in his mouth. He growled, balling both hands into fists. “That’s what I’m saying! There’s no changing D --” he snarled, furious at his own tongue “-- the Boar, he’s always been like this. He put on a poor show of hiding his tusks and hooves at the academy, but he’s dropped the act now. This is the _Royal Highness_ we are all swore to protect - nothing more than some wild animal in Blaiddyd armor.”

Glenn sighed and looked to Sylvain. “Please tell me how this is going to work.”

Sylvain rolled to rest on his forearm as he looked at the other two, analyzing them both. “Because it’s our only option. But before we try whatever Felix’s way is, I can go in there and try to work my magic.” He gave them both a smile and raised his brows. “Huh? What do you think? I don’t have that centuries-long Fraldarius-Blaiddyd blood bond, or whatever it is that keeps you guys so weirdly loyal, but I am a man of good Faerghus stock.” He sat up and brushed himself off, gathering up his confidence. “And I know him pretty well too, if I do say so myself.”

Neither of them looked entirely convinced, but Glenn was more willing to take a risk. “Fine. If that doesn’t work, I guess we’ll do whatever it is Felix intends to do. Which is?”

Felix kicked at one of the legs of the chair Glenn was sitting in and Glenn yanked his arm towards him, both of them reduced to snapping and snarling at each other in a matter of seconds.

“All right. Guess I go first.”

* * *

Felix hadn’t been the only one spending his time ogling Dimitri day in and day out. There were nights when Sylvain needed to stretch his legs and check on two of his dearest friends. So he stood - a distance away from Felix and Dimitri - and watched. He didn’t know what Felix was looking for, didn’t know whatever it was going on between them. It was like a magnet - the way they pulled at one another, the desire that made them crawl any distance, sink their claws into each other and pull them closer. They had been like this in their Academy days as well, but nothing quite like the staredown Felix leveled at Dimitri’s back every day now. At least when they were at the Academy, Felix could pretend that sparring was enough to sate whatever closeness he allowed himself. Sparring constantly, always trying to better himself next to Dimitri. And for what? The moment where one had the other pinned, demanded the other to yield, both glistening with sweat and desperately sucking in whatever breath they could gather?

Sylvain had seen it happen enough times that he could practically choreograph the whole affair behind his eyelids. It wasn’t his fault his friends were weirdly in love and in denial. It was even less his fault that they both handed him front row tickets to every event they held together, Felix vs Dimitri, see which one cracked under the pressure first, see which one almost brushed the other’s shoulder on the way out of the Dining Hall, out of class, on their way to their rooms at night. He’d love to not have their various semi-chaste sparring fantasies play in the back of his skull every time he watched them both stare at each other from across the room. He had better things to think about and should not be busying himself with their lackluster foreplay. Their banter was fun, but the heavy tension in the air left afterwards choked out any other attempt at conversation.

Now they stood in the silence of the Cathedral together, as Felix and Sylvain both stared at the back of their future King, electric currents running between the two of them.

Sylvain wasn’t sure what Felix was waiting for, or if he was planning that far ahead to begin with. Sylvain was waiting for a tell. A few times in his sentry duty, he noticed when the moonlight struck him at a certain angle, Dimitri’s stance would shift. The bones in his shoulders would ease, his posture would droop ever so slightly. He would relax, a few centimeters of calm revealed in the darkness that Sylvain could hone in on. An entrance, a look into whatever it was Dimitri was trying to hide from.

So Sylvain stood there.

The minutes stretched on, but his gaze never waivered. He had caught it before, right around the same time every night. All he needed was a little patience, something Felix could learn from if --

Dimitri’s foot shifted, his shoulders drawing in slowly. _There_.

Sylvain moved from his perch and approached Dimitri, turning to face him. “Hey,” Sylvain said, his voice quiet. From the distance, Sylvain could hear a dubious snort. Sylvain pointedly ignored any other commentary from Felix. “Your Highness?” Dimitri’s head rolled up to look at him, his one good eye haunted, an ocean blue filled with horrors that tried to crest from the deep. Sylvain stood his ground, placing both hands on his shoulders.

“Your Highness,” Sylvain repeated slowly, trying to meet his gaze. Much like with Felix, Dimitri now seemed more content to avoid eye contact, his single eye moving from the ceiling to the wall to the floor, anywhere that wasn’t Sylvain. Sylvain was persistent, though. Anyone could attest to that. “No. Dimitri, you and I need to have a little talk.” His lips slowly curled into a smile, his posture loosening. “Shoe's on the other foot now, y’know? I don’t think I’ve ever had to scold you quite like you scolded me all those nights at school.” Dimitri didn’t respond, the thin line of his mouth drawn tight. He looked like he was in pain, like every micromovement brought him so much anguish. Sylvain wet his lips and pushed forward.

“We need you, Dimitri. We’ve been fighting in this war for five years, working our asses off and barely holding onto a stalemate with the Empire. We’ve kept them off our backs, but they still hold most of the territory. We think if you make a grand reappearance, it might rally some of the neutral territories onto our side again. Faerghus needs its King, but more than that, we all need you. Me, Ingrid, Glenn, even Felix. We all need you.” He didn’t like sounding so desperate, but maybe a plea to the heart was what Dimitri really needed. Goddess knew he wouldn’t get that from Felix, not without a fight.

Dimitri looked up at him and his lip pulled back, slowly exposing teeth. “The only use for me is to separate that woman’s head from her shoulders,” Dimitri muttered, steeling up his stature in moments. “I am not your rallying cry. I am not your Dimitri. I do not want your companionship, your comfort. I want her _dead_.” He brought a hand up to hold Sylvain’s cheek, the metal of his gauntlet ice cold from the evening air. Sylvain leaned into the touch, a glutton for punishment. If this was how he lost his own head, so be it. At least it was by the hand of a friend and not some faceless Empire soldier. “If you value your life, you’ll leave. Before you end up as another one of my ghosts.”

Sylvain parted his lips around a word that couldn’t leave his throat, another half-hearted plea. His hands formed fists on Dimitri’s shoulders and he shut his eyes, trying not to seem frustrated with him. “We won’t leave you. Not again, buddy. I promise.” He pulled Dimitri into a tight embrace, one the other did not return. Sylvain rested his cheek against the thick fur of Dimitri’s cloak, breathing in its lingering musk. Monster or not, he didn’t seem to hate the contact, letting Sylvain get close without much of a fight. “Well, whatever you’ve been doing, 'grats on finally being taller than me. Next on the list, we need to get you in the sauna, stat.” He pulled away and laughed, running a hand through his own hair. “Couldn’t hurt.”

Dimitri turned back to stone, his gaze back on the ruined stained glass. Sylvain let out a noisy sigh and put his hands on his hips. “That’s it? You don’t even want to ask if I’m still up to my old ways?” He shook his head, faux disappointment on his face. “Nothing. don’t want to ask how I balance being the Kingdom’s top tactician while still keeping my bed warm for any lady that piques my interest?” Dimitri’s expression didn’t change. The sliver of an opening Sylvain found was lost between them. “Nothing. Okay, got it.”

He walked back to Felix, unimpressed with his appeal to their oldest friend. “Well, that was a waste of time,” Felix muttered. Sylvain clicked his tongue, turning Felix away from Dimitri and looping a comforting arm around him again. This time, Felix was quick to throw him off. Sylvain recovered quickly and shoved his hands in his pockets.

“I disagree,” Sylvain answered. “I think we learned a lot.”

Felix made a face and looked up at him, searching for some answer without words. Sylvain was more than happy to put words to just about anything, luckily for them both. “He’s not possessed, for one.”

“I already said that,” Felix said, though Sylvain shushed him and continued.

“He’s not possessed, and he is lucid. It’s not a demon, though there definitely is one in the Relic Weapon. Glasya told me that much.” They left the Cathedral, making his way to the dormitories together. “What’s more important is, what did you learn, Felix?”

Felix set his jaw, his eyes looking out into the darkness. “That if anyone is going to handle the Boar, it’ll be me, and it’ll be my way. Talking isn’t going to work.”

Sylvain slapped his back affectionately. “Thatta boy. I’m a little worried, but I’m sure you’ll figure it out.”

He would. He had to.

* * *

Felix was done standing around. It was long past time to bring the Boar to heel. Sylvain’s display cemented it in his mind: no amount of waiting, begging, or pleading would bring Dimitri back. It had to be Felix, and he had to do it soon. Otherwise, they’d be lost in the tides of the war, and all of his searching and waiting and watching would be for nothing.

He went to bed that night ready to face the monster he trained his entire life to fight, ready to face him in the morning.

No more waiting.


	6. Unrelenting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Felix confronts Dimitri and hopes to find a way to ready him to face the war with the other Blue Lions.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger warning for this chapter for major bodily harm. it is referenced but not discussed in detail. It takes place at the end of the chapter, please read at your discretion.

Felix wasn’t trying to kid himself: he knew this wouldn’t be easy. Glenn had said as much - Dimitri was a wall that stretched on endlessly from both sides, into the sky with no foreseeable start or stop. No one had broken through to Dimitri yet. Even though they knew he wasn’t possessed, that didn’t explain why he was acting the way he was. Felix could guess - the monster that appeared all those years ago when they were hardly past boyhood had taken hold of what was left of Dimitri’s mind, pushing out the last few scraps of nobility and softness he tried to pass off as a cover to the wayside.

That didn’t mean Felix stopped watching. On the contrary - he maintained constant vigilance.

Every day, every night, he would stand by him in the Monastery. Dimitri rarely moved, rooted to one spot as he looked up through the cracked stained glass. It was just as it had been before Sylvain tried to speak to him - nothing changed. Nothing budged. The Boar was gone, only a husk of a body left for the monster to pilot and use as it saw fit. It made Felix’s tongue taste of acid, made his teeth grind in his mouth. If wasn’t as if he /wanted/ to see their future King reduced to a snarling, sniveling beastman. At least at Garreg Mach, Dimitri still whimpered and looked at him like there was a person behind his facade. At least the Boar could still be passed off as a prince.

Now? There was no hope.

No hope, but Felix had spent five years fighting back hopelessness.

He spent most of his life climbing walls constructed around him. All his life, he had to struggle and train and grow to fill even a quarter of the shadow Glenn left behind. Not because he wanted to, but because that was what was expected of him. A Fraldarius could not exist without acting as a Shield for the King, and Felix could not be permitted to continue on through life as a small, crying child. He had to surpass his brother, become stronger not because he was told to, but to show the world that he was more than the dead man they built up in their hopes and dreams.

And now that dead man was heading out to Fraldarius with Sylvain to go bring his father back, along with the remaining Blue Lions who had been stationed in the remaining Faerghus territories. Sylvain made Felix promise that he wouldn’t do anything too reckless and would focus on the task at hand - try to bring Dimitri to a semi presentable state, or get ready for a long and painful conversation with their old classmates and his old man.

Felix clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth. _Tch_. As if he was some miracle worker.

If the Boar was going to be presentable, Felix was going to have to devise a plan to get him out of the Monastery and wipe all the grime and blood off him. Felix hadn’t seen him bathe - or eat, or do much of anything - since they all arrived, so that meant he was well overdue for a bath. As if the wafting stench of his furs wasn’t evidence enough of that. He pushed back memories of their last baths shared together as children, sweet maidservants washing them both after a young Felix insisted they not be separated for even a moment. Instead, Felix would have to drag their future king by his ratty cloak and hope enough steam and water could cleanse five years worth of grime from his body.

 _Or_ , Andras helpfully commented, a quiet echo in his own thoughts, _you could just kill him_.

Felix scrunched his face up, considering for a moment. Dimitri was far too strong to take on, even with Andras to help him. Felix was strong, but he was no fool. The Boar was a terror, and the odds of taking him down were not in his favor. Glenn had spoken highly enough of his strength in this less-than-humanoid state.

 _We cannot kill him_ , Felix answered. Andras made a small huff, but allowed Felix to continue. _He is going to be the King_.

 _You cannot kill him because you love him_ , Andras corrected. Felix shut his commentary out a second later, too annoyed to bother arguing with the demon that lived in his sword. He was not in love with this animal. There wasn’t a single redeeming quality left in him to love anymore.

Felix left his usual spot and walked up to Dimitri, his presence only acknowledged with a noisy sniff. Felix narrowed his eyes and put a hand on his shoulder, roughly turning the Boar to face him. He was close now. He caught the hint of a scar under the black eyepatch where his left eye once was, the other cloudy and lost. His lips were cracked, his hair thick and greasy where it fell over the severe cut of his cheekbones and jaw. His brows drew in close as he was rudely pulled from his standing slumber, a hint of teeth revealed with the small quirk of a sneer.

“What do you want,” he croaked out, voice rough and gravel worn with disuse.

Felix, as ever, was unimpressed with the display. “The rest of our class is coming in a few days, and you’re disgusting.” Dimitri went to turn back around, but Felix’s grip was too tight for him to slink away. “No more sulking in the Monastery. You are coming with me, or I’ll knock you out and drag you to the sauna myself.” Dimitri’s hand flexed at his side, his eye scanning Felix as if to appraise him. Felix didn’t flinch, already wound too tight to wonder if he should be scared. He was too close to the monster to consider his chances for survival. He wouldn’t entertain the possibility that he could fail at someone so simple as coaxing a man to take a bath.

They stood there, watching one another, waiting for the first strike. Felix would be faster, he always had been - he’d draw his blade and block the lance on his back, or the slash of a clawed gauntlet, try to get him onto his back and -

“Fine.”

He walked past Felix without another word. Metal scraped against the wooden floors as he trudged away, unwilling to even lift his feet with each step. Felix remained where he stood, near paralyzed with anger. His first conversation with Dimitri in years, and they nearly came to blows over nothing. Felix was alert, but he didn’t know how long he’d last if he was constantly looking for the lance at his throat or the claw slashing at his face. He let out a quick, aggravated noise - if he didn’t, he’d never remember to breathe - and turned to jog after him. Always chasing the Boar, always following in his footsteps.

They arrived at the sauna as Felix moved into a small changing room and began undressing. He removed his sword, his bow, his jacket, his tunic, his gaiters, stripping down and changing into the simple sauna clothes that somehow managed to remain perfectly wearable and untouched after 5 years of ruin and neglect. He looked down at the mess of weapons and protection he left in his wake, calculating his chances for survival without protection. It wasn’t safe to tend to the Boar without a weapon. He removed a dagger from the messy pile and hid it in his shorts, moving to the sauna room to see it was still empty.

“Boar,” he called out, his head whipping around to try and find him. Silence greeted him, frustration and unease quickly becoming his natural state. Felix huffed and left the room, banging on the doors to the other changing rooms. He threw open the first door he heard movement behind to see Dimitri sitting on the bench, his single eye looking lost as he stared at the ground between his feet, unchanged. Felix made a pinched noise and moved closer, testing the fastening at his neck. “Pathetic. You can’t even undress yourself.”

Dimitri didn’t make a move as Felix helped him out of his armor, his one eye staring on vacant as each piece of armor was removed. The man in the Monastery and the man before him seemed different, somehow. Both monsters, of course, though this one slumbered while the other lay in wait. Felix couldn’t take solace in this reprieve - all it meant was that the beast could wake within him at any time. The dagger burned against his skin, his only shred of protection.

Felix removed each piece of armor, fingers working around the fastenings on his chestplate, his pauldrons, his gauntlets and greaves. They peeled off Dimitri slowly, as if they clung to his skin like chitin. With each piece removed, the stench in the small room only grew worse. He had been standing in his own filth for who knew how long, killing bandits and painting black armor in blood. From this close, he could see the layers of grime packed under his fingernails, broken and jagged from where his gauntlets kept them from growing long. Despite growing taller and more powerful as the years passed by, so much of Dimitri’s growth was stunted. Felix realized he was holding Dimitri’s hand, smoothing his thumb over the freshly exposed skin on the back of his palm. He pulled back as if he had been burned.

“Change into the clothes here or I’ll kill you.”

He shut the door behind him and stood watch, arms folded tight over his chest. He couldn’t pretend to feel sorry for the Boar. If he did, he would only catch Felix unawares and kill him when he least expected it. Beasts did not seek pity - and a creature like the one Dimitri had become was no exception. Even if he looked familiar, Felix should not search for Dimitri. He knew his efforts would come up fruitless.

Dimitri appeared shortly after Felix left in matching clothes, his eye still vacant. His eyepatch was missing and Felix could now see what was left of the mangled side of his face - a huge, knife-like scar across the left side of his face, the lid forced shut. Felix guessed that was the work of his brother, Dimitri wasn’t one for healing. A beast was meant for killing, not saving. Felix grabbed two buckets of water and shoved a handful of towels into Dimitri’s arms.

Felix shut the door behind them with his back and made his way to the stones in the center of the sauna, kneeling down in front of them. “Go sit.” He didn’t bother to turn around to see if Dimitri obeyed. The magic sigil that generated heat still seemed to be in working order, thank the Goddess. Felix had no capacity for fire magic, and didn’t feel like nursing a flame just to scrub dirt from the Boar’s hide. He pressed his palm into the sigil and funneled what little magic he had, a small fire pit under the bench roaring to life. Felix sat back and waited a few minutes, letting the warmth of the flame lick his face. It was the first taste of life he had felt since Sylvain and Glenn left him alone. He had stopped counting the days on the pillar in the Monastery. Had it been days? Weeks? He let the thought fall by the wayside, gone from his mind with a slow, measured exhale.

Once the stones felt warm enough from a distance, Felix picked up a bucket and poured cool water across them, a noisy hiss and steam quickly filling the room. The bucket returned to the floor and Felix moved to check on Dimitri. It was startling how he almost looked human, a semblance of his old self as he sat, arms at his side and head turned to the floor. Felix sighed and brought up another bucket, grabbing one of the smaller towels and dunking it in the cool water.

“Hold still.”

He took one of Dimitri’s hands again - ragged, rough skin, almost leathery - and scrubbed at the dirt under his nails, the scratchy cotton of the towel removing the dead skin on top. He worked up each arm, slowly but surely. Dimitri seemed content to let Felix work, remaining limp and mute all the while. He wrung out the towel and exchanged it for a new one, each discarded towel coated in the filth that once clung to the Boar. Felix tried not to wretch beside them. How disgusting, though he supposed an animal like him preferred a mud bath.

He parted from Dimitri to toss more water on the stones and let out a shaky breath. He hated the saunas, they always were far too hot. The men of Faerghus only went to saunas during the coldest of winters, usually cleaning themselves in wash basins instead. Felix was in no mood to try and give the Boar a full body sponge bath, so this would have to suffice. He peeled the shirt from his body, looking up to see Dimitri had done the same. Felix remained where he was and looked at the scars that littered his skin, glowing pink against milky white. He was sure his own scars looked the same and thought no more of it. With war time brought new artwork to skin trained for scars and battle. No need to dwell on where they came from, which lucky bastards pierced the Boar’s armor.

“Why are you doing this?” Dimitri’s voice sounded hollow and far off as he spoke, never looking up as Felix walked around to scrub his back.

“I told you, you’re filthy. When was the last time you bathed?” His tone had softened with the rising steam. It was harder than he expected to be cruel to someone who wasn’t being cruel to him, no matter how furious he was.

“No, that’s not it.” He sighed and rolled his shoulders, sitting up straight. Felix paused, clutching the washcloth tight in his hands. He had to be prepared at any moment, for any shift. He silently moved the dagger from his thigh to his empty hand, glaring holes into the Boar’s back. “Why are you here?”

“We have to bring you back.” Even in this pathetic, wretched state. Even while Dimitri was more monster than man, now obvious to all of their friends and his family. Even while Dimitri was less than human.

“And if I say no?” He leaned back in his seat, the corded muscles of his shoulders flexing. Felix tried not to swallow his tongue.

“I’ll drag you back by your ankles,” he whispered, his voice hoarse. Another result of the heat. “You don’t get to walk away from your duty.” If Felix couldn’t, Dimitri wasn’t allowed to, either. Dimitri sighed and stood up, his back still facing Felix. He could count the scars, the various spots from arrows that managed to pierce through gaps in his armor and hit tender flesh.

“Felix, you know me better than anyone else. You know there is nothing left worth saving.” He turned and faced him, though his eye still didn’t seem to catch the glint of Felix’s knife. “The Dimitri that you know is gone. There is nothing left of me to save, my sole purpose in life is to kill her.” He looked at the knife and back to Felix, still crouched in a defensive position. Felix swallowed around nothing. “I can never be your King. Leave me here to do my final job and put the souls she has trapped here to rest so I may be free. Go back to them. Tell them you’ve failed.”

The last shred of Felix’s patience gave way. He could almost hear the twang of a too-taut bowstring reverberate between his eardrums. He was always too taut - working himself until his knuckles bled and his mind was too exhausted to entertain thought. He was always on edge; clenching his teeth, tightening every muscle in his body like a panther waiting to strike. Felix realized belatedly that he’d been waiting all this time for Dimitri to tell him something so stupid he’d lose all sense of reason and act out in desperation.

Felix dropped the washcloth and took hold of Dimitri’s forearm, pulling him down to his level. Dimitri was still in there, a piece of the person Felix once called his friend floating in the endless ocean of Dimitri’s only eye. Felix could reach in and grab it, bring him back to safety if only Dimitri would let him. The dagger clattered uselessly to the ground as his hands pressed against Dimitri’s cheeks and held him tight, his heart hammering out an unsteady rhythm in his chest.

“I won’t,” Felix growled out, his voice ragged and labored. His body ached with the pressure of twenty two years of tension all trying to leave his body at once. “I can’t.” Felix’s fingers curled against Dimitri’s skin. “You don’t get to decide if I’ve failed or not.” Dimitri’s face remained passive as he stared past Felix into the soft, steamy space of the sauna, the power of Felix’s words unable to pass through his skull. “You have to let me try first.” A new voice that came from everywhere and nowhere at once answered instead.

 _I can help with that_.

The two disappeared from the sauna, leaving nothing but the resonant sound of air rushing to fill the space they left behind.

* * *

Felix did not usually let Andras bring him into their shared space, the span of whiteness reminding him of worthless arguments and leaving him disoriented. He sought refuge in its nothingness only when the battle overwhelmed him and he was knocked unconscious, preferring Andras’s scolding to the constant berating of his thoughts for daring to fall.

However, this was not the space they shared. While familiar, it was not his own. It was Dimitri’s.

Dimitri sat in a small chair, wearing his full regalia once more. A new person joined them in this space - a man in all white armor, blonde hair, and a tired expression painted permanently on his face. Felix frowned and walked closer, arms folded.

“You must be the Boar’s demon.”

He turned to face Felix and nodded, resting a hand on Dimitri’s shoulder. “That is correct. I am Paimon, the demon that resides in Areadbhar.” He sighed and squeezed Dimitri’s shoulder, looking down at him like a worried mother. He was subdued, quiet and present in a way that starkly contrasted every demon Felix had met until this point. Andras was sharp and cut in with nasty, bloodthirsty commentary, while Sylvain’s was rash and possessive. Even his encounter with Glenn’s demon was far more harrowing than this. Felix found himself unafraid as he faced down the demon that resided in one of the most dangerous weapons in Fodlan.

As he looked between the demon and the boar, a slow-growing sense of pity began to fester in his gut. Felix tried to shake it off, flexing his fingers to release the tension beginning to build within him again.

“What have you done to him? Why is he like this?” Paimon didn’t turn to face Felix - a common trait among Blaiddyds and their servants, it seemed - instead keeping his attention on the Boar.

“I have done nothing. I have served the Blaiddyd line since our essence was trapped in the relic weapons by Nemesis and the Ten Elites. I do not work based on contracts.”

So Dimitri wasn’t possessed. That much he already knew. However -

“You didn’t answer my second question.”

“Ah,” Paimon corrected, standing up straighter and looking Felix over. “You are right. I apologize.” He stepped forward and looked at the new guest in his shared space, a tired smile tugging his lips up. “It has been some time since I’ve entertained a Fraldarius. Not since Loog and Kyphon.” Two seats appeared behind them as Paimon gestured for Felix to sit. Felix, with little option to do much else, took a seat given to him and folded his arms, waiting for the explanation.

Dimitri sat in the same place he had been since arriving in the endless white room.

“Why is he like this?” Felix repeated as he gestured over to him, his single eye staring off at nothing. “He was always terrible at pretending to be human like the rest of us, but this is --” It shook Felix in a way that he wasn’t sure he could put into words. The Boar at the Academy was lying, sure, but this Boar now was so much more dangerous. Untethered in a way that had allowed for seeds of /fear/ to grow in Felix’s mind. He still remembered the first time he saw Dimitri shed his skin, crushing the skull of a man at the tender age of fifteen. He held back a shudder.

“I met him about four years ago, and he was the same. I do not know what his captors did to put him in such a state.” Felix huffed a loud sigh and looked away. Cornelia. With the declaration of regicide, Felix scrunched his features at the thought of how she kept Dimitri captive, what horrors she delighted in as the world rang weary at word of his execution. Felix grimaced.

“He begged me to help him defeat the Emperor, and I agreed. He pledged his body and soul to me.” In a second, Felix was on his feet and standing over the demon so casually mentioning his utter ownership of Dimitri. Paimon only held up a single hand. “I did not take it. I do not need a contract to serve the Blaiddyd family - anyone who touches the weapon without Blaiddyd blood is at my mercy, that has long since been the payment for my service.”

Right. Felix remembered the bloody battle that came with retrieving the Lance of Ruin, the horrific transformation that took place when Miklan tried to use it. This time, he was unable to hold the shudder back as he returned to his seat. “When do you answer my question, demon?”

Paimon sighed and propped his elbow up on the arm of the chair, pillowing his cheek on his fist. “I’m afraid I don’t have a good answer, son of Fraldarius. I can’t speak to him here, and speaking in the physical world produces a similar result.”

Felix’s jaw clicked shut shortly after he realized it went slack. “Wait -- how is that possible? You’re in his head, can’t you just, I don’t know - figure out what happened?”

Paimon pursed his lips and leaned in closer. “We are not in his Highness’s head. This is a space between your world and mine. I have no more exclusive access than you do.” He stood up slowly and walked to Felix’s chair, placing a hand on both arms and locking eyes. “I believe you can, though. The bond between Blaiddyd and Fraldarius is well over a thousand years old, and if anyone can figure out what happened, it’s you.”

It was the same thing everyone else had told him. Because he was the Boar’s cosmically assigned handler, he could magically fix him. He snarled up at the demon and crossed his legs, arms tight over his chest. “How do you propose I do that? All my tactics did was summon you here to tell me you’re utterly useless.”

Paimon left Felix and returned to Dimitri, still sitting stock still. He stayed there for an indeterminate stretch of time, a hand on his shoulder, silent. Felix felt goosebumps break out at the nape of his neck, holding his position for as long as he could manage until the silence made him want to scream. He stomped over to them both as they looked like some sad rendition of a father holding his dead son, a painting he could see hanging over some grand foyer in the Palace at the capital.

“How am I supposed to know what to do? Answer me!”

Paimon turned to face him, his expression unreadable. “Talk to him. Break through his rhythm. Help him understand that he should be here, with his friends. With you.”

Felix couldn’t hold back the yell of frustration now as he tugged at uneven clumps of hair. When Dimitri was pronounced dead, he couldn’t stand to look at himself in the mirror anymore, couldn’t remember the way he used to glide his hands through his hair and --

“Why do you know who I am?”

Paimon smiled slowly tapping the center of Dimitri’s breast plate. “I may not reside in his thoughts, but he repeats your name like a mantra. The bond between you two is one of the few things I can recognize.” He stepped away and nodded to Felix. “Go to him. I’m here if you need me, but right now, he needs you.”

Dimitri needed him. Of course he did. Everyone seemed to need Felix nowadays. It didn’t stop him as he slowly dropped to his knees, holding Dimitri’s cheeks again. His skin was unnaturally cold, more like raw meat than human flesh. Felix kept the wave of nausea at bay as he took a deep breath and held on tight.

“Boar. Wherever you are, whatever happened to you - you need to come back. If you don’t, the Emperor will kill us all.” He didn’t budge. Felix swallowed hard, thankful for the emptiness of the room around them. Nothing at all, no one to hear him say the next words that came out of his mouth. “I need you to come back. All that time you were gone, I was - I was looking for you. I needed to believe you were alive so I couldn’t hate myself for not being there. I was always so - so cruel to you. I only wanted you back.” Tears fell down his face, clumping his lower lashes together. “I’m sorry, Dimitri.”

Dimitri’s hand slowly reached up and grabbed his wrist.

The space between them winked out, Felix and Dimitri in the same position as they had been moments ago. Dimitri sitting on one of the benches in the sauna, stone faced and kingly, with Felix on his knees in front of him, a knight pledging his loyalty. The sudden shift back into their world knocked the air out of his lungs, leaving him disoriented as he clutched Dimitri’s face tight to keep himself steady.

Dimitri’s grip on Felix’s wrist went tight as well, and Felix couldn’t bite back the scream of pain as his bones shattered. He tried to pull back, but the hand at his wrist slid down to his forearm. As Felix reeled back, Dimitri yanked hard in the other direction.

The last thing Felix remembered was falling to the ground as the world blacked out around him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope you enjoy yet another lovely art installment by @kainiia on twitter! oh, the tender face touch

**Author's Note:**

> welcome to my wild ride of a dimilix demon au! thank you to my wonderful artist @kainiia on twitter and thank you to mo and anna for beta-reading, if you'd like to hear more about the fic feel free to leave a comment and a kudos, or come talk to me about it on twitter at @danivonfemblem!


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